AOL And Time Warner (Cable) Might Merge For Real?

from the nah...-never-happen... dept

It's been four and a half years since AOL and Time Warner did their disastrous merger. Despite the widely held sentiment that this merger was just a bad idea from the beginning, it still seems like it could have been a good thing, if the companies had done a better job actually merging the companies. One of the biggest problems has always been that there barely was any merger at all. AOL always seemed like a separate, disliked, step child of Time Warner (despite the purchase going the other way). Which is why, for years, we've had these bizarre stories about AOL competing with Time Warner cable for broadband customers. Finally, in 2004, the companies realized that they weren't two separate companies at all, and it might make sense to work together. Of course, saying it and doing it are two very different things. So, earlier this year, they, once again, said that AOL and Time Warner Cable would work together. However, it looks like some people are finally realizing that keeping the two as two separate companies is contributing to this lack of integration. So, while chairman Richard Parsons insists he wasn't interested in spinning off AOL, Broadband Reports is pointing to rumors that AOL might get merged into Time Warner Cable when the latter goes public. You mean it only took about five years for the company to realize that maybe they'd be better off merging the two divisions that compete with each other? And people wonder why the merger was a disaster?